I can see where my colleague gets that from the way RNS covered the opening of the park, where Ken Ham, founder of Answers in Genesis, has built a full-size replica of the biblical barge. But despite a few flaws, I still like the story -- especially compared with some of the competition.

The RNS piece is a luxuriant 1,500 words, enough to cover several facets. And it gives us an expansive, non-cynical description:

The park’s centerpiece features three decks of exhibits explaining Answers in Genesis’ views of the biblical flood account and life-size figures depicting what life on the ark might have been like for Noah and his family — an extravaganza Ham described as "beyond Hollywood."

The park also features a two-story restaurant, aerial zipline cables and the Ararat Ridge Zoo with goats, ponies, emus and more animals. The next phase of park construction likely will include a walled city "that takes you back to Noah’s day" with shops, restaurants and street performers that visitors will walk through as they approach the ark, said Michael Zovath, chief action officer for Answers in Genesis and project director for the Ark Encounter.

But the Ark Encounter is "not just for entertainment," said Ham, president and CEO of Answers in Genesis.

It’s to "proclaim God’s word and the gospel," he said. It’s meant to show — in keeping with Answers in Genesis’ ministry, focused on issues such as creation, evolution, science and the age of the Earth — that the biblical flood account is historic and the Bible is true in regard to history and science.

But the RNS piece goes beyond p.r. It recounts the "rough waters" -- criticism by "freethinkers," legal tussles over tax breaks, disagreement from Christians who don’t read the Bible as literally as Ham & Company.

We joke about having guilt files here at GetReligion — folders full of stories that we’d like to look at and analyze but don’t get around to for one reason or another. I have one from May of last year headlined “Mormons struggling with doubt turn to online support groups.” I thought it such an intriguing topic and one handled well by focusing on a particular expression of doubt in a single religious community.